Descartes: A Biography

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 Descartes: A Biography

the uneducated) is consistent with the technical claims of early modern

astronomy.

Although Descartes escaped the official attention of the Roman censor

until, the Congregation of the Holy Office was prompted to open

a case against him by reports from two theological examiners, Father

Stefano Spinula and Father Agostino Tartaglia.Spinula reported that

he had read two of Descartes’ books,The Principles of Philosophyand

The Passions of the Soul, and that he had found five theses in each work

from which conclusions that were inconsistent with the Catholic faith

could easily be deduced. For his part, Tartaglia consulted theMeditations

and the Latin edition of theDiscourse on Method,Dioptrics and Meteors

(which was published under the titleSpecimens of Philosophy), and he also

found a number of theses that he described as ‘insufficiently safe’ and

‘not sufficiently consistent with sacred doctrine’.

While Spinula mentioned the Earth’s circular motion around the Sun

among the questionable doctrines that he identified, the main focus of

the two reports was not on Descartes’ endorsement of the Copernican

system. Instead, he attracted the attention of scholastic theologians by

two other discussions that were primarily philosophical in the traditional

sense. One was his venture into the theology of the Eucharist, and the

other was his account of human nature. The official examiners were con-

cerned about his general theory of the physical world (that he denied the

‘prime matter’ of Aristotle, that he denied that material things have sub-

stances that are distinct from their properties, and that he claimed that

the material world extends indefinitely into space). They were particu-

larly concerned about the possible implications of that natural philosophy

forTrent’s theology of the Eucharist. For example, Descartes seemed

to claim that the properties of bread and wine were not ‘real accidents’

and, therefore, that they could not exist apart from the bread and wine of

which they were properties. The examiners were equally worried about

the Cartesian account of the mind (whether it was sufficiently indepen-

dent of the human body), and about his account of free will and human

knowledge.

Once these reports were submitted in September, the Congrega-

tion of the Holy Office decided onOctober that some of Descartes’

works were dangerous to the Catholic faith, and the Congregation of the

Index announced the decision. The long list of books proscribed by

the Congregation of the Index, including Descartes’, was introduced by

the phrase: ‘the following publications are banned.’